My Personal Development by community contributions and new experiences

Starting my IT career on a service desk many years ago, I was what I would consider your typical ‘nerd’. I anticipated that I would be happy as a System Admin looking after a large environment. I spent a lot of time in front of a screen, wasn’t overly social. I spent countless hours playing with technology.

As time has passed, I still have a great passion for technology and have used this passion to develop my career. As my passion drove me to learn more, I took a few opportunities that helped me out of my ‘nerd’ world. For me this has been a transition away from being the ‘hands on’ engineer to more of an ‘evangelist’.

The most dominant of these opportunities was Public Speaking. Getting up on a stage in front of colleagues and other industry professionals is daunting the first time around. Being incredibly nervous I think from memory speed talking my way through my presentation. It was a great experience, and I have been improving my public speaking ever since.

It was after this experience that I became more open minded, and started exploring ways to further develop myself outside of my daily job. The experience also inspired me to give back and share my knowledge and experiences to a broader community.

Whilst public speaking was an avenue of passion for me I desired other avenues of giving back. I started to investigate other mediums, and found that these are the ways I am able to share my knowledge and experiences with the community as a whole;

Personal Blog

Speaking Engagements

Networking Events

Social Media

Tutoring

Using the above mediums, I am able to inspire and help people. Whilst not being consistent on all these mediums I do share where I can. The feeling you get inside when someone approaches you and thanks you for sharing your knowledge or experience is rewarding.

This rewarding feeling has helped me grow my confidence and driven my career in interesting ways. I am no longer the ‘nerd’ that spent too much time in front of a screen. Putting myself out their has helped me build many new relationships across the globe which is amazing. I am also educating myself in different technologies and also industries to broaden my skills.

I am thankful for the opportunities I have had, and recently agreed to take part in another medium to give back to the community. Soon, I will be mentoring uni students (good luck to them). Assisting them on the transition from education into an IT career.

I am looking forward to another new experience, and I am excited to see what’s on the horizon.